Ak Story? Here's one from a Maadi I sold in 1995.....
Learning to Hunt:
Although I am a late starter, I love hunting. I grew up in the foothills of theAdirondack Mountains in New York State, but I never hunted until I took it onmyself to buy a rifle and get my first license as a 20-year old in 1990.Huntinghas grown from a couple of weekends in 1990 to a year round obsession in lessthan a decade, and I can't get enough.
I had a lot of learning to do. I hunted solo the first year. The closest that Icame to getting a shot was when I was still-hunting up a small ridge. As Ineared the summit, I could hear something moving fast on the other side. A fatdoe popped over the top and skidded to a halt about five yards away. I didn'thave an antlerless tag, and I'm not sure who was more surprised. She was soclose that I could smell her. Our eyes locked, and then she gave a snort andtrotted away, while I waited in vain for a buck to follow.
The second year went much the same except that I linked up with some olderhunters who took pity on me and offered to help teach me to hunt. We hunted onmy parents' 63 acres of rolling fields and hardwoods and these fellows took twonice deer that I pushed to them with many hours of walking while they keptwatch. I sure learned a lot about driving, but not much about shooting. Everytime that I wanted to hunt the ridges, these guys assured me that deer alwaysstayed in the valleys, and that I should push the swamps to catch them in theirbeds. I began to think something was up when the same thing happened the nextyear. I saw a few tails and a few does, but ended up pushing bucks to mycompanions while my tags went unfilled. After their tags were filled, I beganto walk the ridges and without any surprise found good rubs and scrapeswherever it was hard going to get to. I found tracks, beds, and saw a fewtails. And I learned where the bucks bedded, but could not sneak up on thoseridge bedded bucks no matter how I tried. The one shot I had misfired becausethe rifle had iced over during freezing rain. Yes, I was already hooked onhunting enough to stay out for hours in freezing rain!
The third year I told the older guys that I wanted to hunt the high groundopening day, but they convinced me to try "just one sweep" in thevalley. Sure enough, they bagged a buck and by the time it was dressed andhauled to the house, it was lunchtime. After lunch, I decided to go to the highground, even though it was the wrong time of day. I figured anything that hadbeen chased out of the valleys might have holed up on top.
It was unusually warm that day. I slow stalked up a steep, shale covered slopein bright afternoon sunlight. I knew that there was a shelf just before thesummit and could envision a big buck lying on that shelf watching the valleybelow. By taking the steepest route I could not be seen from the shelf. I wasabout 30 feet from the top after a forty minute climb when I thought that Iheard movement ahead. Instinct took over and I ran to the top, just in time tosee what seemed like a perfect buck gracefully bounding away. Breathing hardfrom my up-hill run, I put my rifle to my shoulder as the universe slipped intoslow motion.
The deer was one bound away from a stone wall at the crest of the hill. If hecleared that, he would be out of sight. I put my sites on him, and took up theslack in the two stage trigger as he gathered himself for the jump. He was inmid air, over the wall, with antlers held high and the sun shining on his coatwhen I placed the sites perfectly behind, and just below his shoulder andpulled the trigger.
It is an instant that will live forever in my memory, a scene so classic itcould have been taken from an advertisement for hunting gear, the perfectlyplaced shot at last instant for a grand trophy. There was only one problem.Click.
That's right, after unloading the rifle for lunch in the house, I had refilledthe magazine but failed to fill the chamber!
It took 2 heartbeats (I felt them) for the disbelief to be turned to determination.I ran up the last slope, and looked over the stone wall at the disappearingform of my high bounding buck. After chambering the first bullet from themagazine I fired twice more just as he entered brush. The first shot knocked abranch off a sapling between us, but the second sent hair flying beyond him. Hekept going, but I was convinced that he was hard hit.
Tracking revealed enough hair to cover a squirrel, and a set of tracks that gotlost in a maze of deer trails, but not one drop of blood. Fearful that I hadwounded him, I prayed that God would give me another chance at the same buck.
Two weeks later, I came down sick. Fever, chills, body ache. No doubt about it,it was the flu. I was too sick to go to work, but when fresh snow startedfalling, I all but crawled outside. It was the first tracking snow of deerseason, and I was home from work. You can't pass up a chance like that!
I hunted away from the house on the ridge tops for an hour when I began towonder what had possessed me to get so far away from the bathroom, then Icrossed fresh tracks still filling with snow (about 30minutes old). Igratefully followed them back toward home. Through thickets, and finally to ajust emptied bed in heavy pines when I heard a stone turn on the stone wall Iknew was 100 yards ahead of me. Running to the wall I saw a buck cuttingbroadside downhill. I fired just once. I was so excited that I actually had myfirst buck (I thought).
I was now within sight of my house and had always heard that you should let adeer lay down and stiffen up if you wound him. 20 minutes later the snow hadstopped when I went out again. At the point my bullet had hit him I foundexactly one drop of blood. My heart sank. What kind of a hunter was I? But solong as he was wounded it was my obligation to follow. He had lain down about500 yards away and there was about as much blood as would fill the palm of yourhand in the bed, and a few drops every few feet beyond that. I knew by thetracks what had happened. He was walking on 3 legs. Somehow my perfectbroadside shot (on a running deer 70 yards away and about 40 feet down hillthrough hardwoods) had hit a leg that bled when he used it.
If it wasn't for the new snow I would never have been able to track him. Ifollowed him for more than a mile before I saw him jump up from a thicket.Determined not to let him get away even if I had to take a shot from the rear,I emptied my 5 round magazine. That put him down with two broken hind legs. I put a finishing shot into his brain toend the chase. He had put up a good fight and I still admire that game littlebuck. He had only a pair of wide forks, but Iwas as proud as if he had been a bull elephant! He was mine, and I did italone, hunting where I knew was best. He had a strip of hair shaved off hisback from hip to shoulder, and I am convinced that he was the same buck that Imissed on the high ridges opening morning. God had given me another chance atthe same deer.
I also learned that the AKM was not the best tool for hunting. The following two years I used an SKS and made one shot kills. So yes you CAN use an AK for hunting, but it really is not the best choice IMHO. These are the sorts of things you figure out when you are learning to hunt.
